The Paladin's Holy Work is one of the more double-edged class features in the game, and the inability to convert makes using many otherwise powerful deities quite difficult. However, since he is immune to punishment he will never actually suffer as a result of his religion choice. For most deities it's a trade-off that will take some skill to manage. The Paladin is a defensively-minded melee brawler, and should look for a deity to support this playstyle.

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Tikki Tooki and the Glowing Guardian are two of the most powerful deities for the Paladin. Both of them offer immensely powerful boons for low-level characters, but are very difficult to maintain piety with until you're a high-level character. Because the Paladin need not fear punishment, once he has his boons of choice he can completely ignore the complaints of these deities. Dracul also works well for the Paladin, though he will not offer quite the same level of power. Jehora Jeheyu is also a fine deity choice, but Holy Work offers little benefit. Jehora never actually deducts piety, and Holy Work does not protect you from his random fits of "boredom", so all you receive is the boon cost discount. However, Jehora remains arguably the strongest deity choice for a "lifer" who never wants to convert, so he still works well for a Paladin. Mystera is moderately useful, but a consolation prize at best for the Paladin.

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Holy Work is the Paladin's defining double-edged class feature, which balances the inability to convert against lower piety costs and an immunity to punishment. Being unable to convert forces the Paladin to use deities monotheistically, which means that deities which normally rely on conversion need to be used differently. However, the Paladin's immunity to punishment compensates for this in two ways, firstly, you don't get punished for angering gods at 0 piety, which means that a Paladin does not need to worry about getting locked out of piety gain (especially relevant with Binlor and Earthmother) and can take actions most classes would need indulgences for (so, using Cydstepp with Tikki Tooki, or healing potions with Dracul or GG), secondly, any piety lost when a Paladin is at 0 piety effectively isn't lost, which can radically increase your overall piety gain with some gods. Lastly, the lower piety cost of boons allows you to get more stat-boosting boons or to get major boons faster, as well as to store up more one-off boons for use against bosses. While the Paladin's other traits primarily encourage his use as a melee fighter, Holy Work makes him more or less as versatile as your proficiency with the gods and understanding of piety gain and loss will allow.

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Taurog, Earthmother, and Binlor are poor choices for the Paladin. They work best when given the option to convert between religions, and are not well suited to the Paladin's particular brand of monotheism. The Pactmaker still functions for the Paladin, and this is the only case where the Paladin can benefit from multiple deities in the same dungeon run, but he receives no discount on the cost of Pacts.

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Holy Hands both starts the Paladin with Halpmeh and lets him restore 1 extra HP/level with it. This complements his physical resistance and encourages regen fighting, as he gets more usefulness (against non-magical monsters) from each HP restored by it than a character without resistances would. It also lets the Paladin effectively regen-fight against Snakes and other poisonous monsters without needing to level up to clear poison afterwards, as well as letting him return to full health without using as much black space as most classes would. Holy Shield gives the Paladin 25% physical resistance, which makes the Paladin generally favour physical attackers (for instance, snakes or medusas) over magical ones (such as warlocks or wraiths), and also encourages the Paladin to be careful about racking up an unclearable number of layers of Curse.

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The paladin is best played as a defensive-oriented brawler. Because of his reliance on HALPMEH, he benefits enormously from the {{i|Soul Orb}} to grant him immunity to mana burn. Balancing bonuses to his resistances, max health, max mana, and damage is key to playing the Paladin effectively. Non-human Paladins will likely need the HP->Attack booster swap to help increase their attack damage. The Dragon Shield is the best preparation for the paladin, boosting his resistances substantially.

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The Glowing Guardian is one of the strongest deity choices for a Paladin for a plethora of reasons. Mana potion or item conversion can fuel early-game absolutions, a GG Paladin does not need to worry about his crippling punishment and can use health and mana potions after consuming all his piety (the combination of Protection, Halpmeh and Health Potions can give), Halpmeh allows you to deliberately poison yourself for extra piety gain and an early enlightenment can really add to the Paladin's strength. Cleansing is superb for physically-driven Paladins. On the minus side, most of the GG's pet peeves aside from potion use are hard to use while building up piety, so a poisoning, lifestealing or Bloodtopowaing GG Paladin is more novel than practical.

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The Dracul Paladin has similar advantages, in that he can combine Blood Swells, Bloodpools and even Lifesteal with healing potions. The Dracul Paladin has a harder early game, since his piety gain is scarcer and taking Sanguine hits his HP, but his late game is comparably strong, with his +15/15 resistances complimenting the Paladin's natural phys res., the use of over-heal to circumvent lower max health, and the ton of extra health offered by sanguine and repeated bloodswells. Taking out undead (especially in the late game) in rounds after using up your piety is very helpful for avoiding piety loss. Bringing in a Vampiric Blade can help with Dracul's low early piety gain.

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Tikki Tooki also offers very useful boons throughout the game and the Paladin benefits substantially from not having to risk his often unmanageable punishments through carelessness. The main issue with TT and particularly a prepped TT is that an incautious Paladin can haemorrhage piety in the mid-game, which will hurt their net piety gain, especially if the Paladin wants to leverage their physical resistances or save up for fairly high-cost second ranks of boons.

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Taurog Paladins are unable to convert out, which makes Taurog's function as a piety farm irrelevant if not paired with the Pactmaker, but compensate for this with a very strong early game on account of how quickly the -20% piety cost lets them rack up Taurog's gear, and the fact that with good timing they can combine spellcasting with high-damage attacks in the early game. The +15/15% resistances from Taurog compliment the Paladin's own, and that of any gear he may find or prep, and the +20% damage bonus from Taurog's boons is very useful for a melee class without any built-in damage bonus. Taurog Paladins are not punished for converting Taurog's gear. While this should be avoided until you've definitely used every death protection you can, in an absolutely desperate case it can push you over a conversion threshold, which might clinch a very close game. The Paladin can get more death protections than any other Taurog user for a massive end game spike.

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Mystera is one of the most disappointing choices for a Paladin, since she offers no obvious synergy with his class features, and her piety gain is generous enough that he'll rarely get to or need to leverage Holy Work.

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The Earthmother is probably the trickiest deity for a Paladin to use, since while his reduced piety cost interacts well with Vine Form and Clearance, and she offers a lot of extra XP over the game, plant generation can create serious mobility problems, especially when Earthmother is prepped. An Earthmother Paladin will tend to have to do a piety-then-plant clearout before level-up. As with Binlor and Taurog, other classes tend to favour using EM as part of a conversion strategy, unlike Binlor and Taurog, her synergies with the paladin are fairly limited.

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Binlor Paladins tend to work in more or less the opposite manner to most Binlor devotees, focussing on clearing out their piety reserves before a level-up to avoid the -10 piety hit. A well-managed Binlor Paladin will thus have 80-90 more piety to spare over a game than other Binlor users. The Binlor Paladin can compliment their physical resists with magic resists and Endiswal use, as well as getting good functionality out of the very powerful Stone Form and Stone Fist boons. Furthermore, while Binlor Paladin's don't really want to be locked out of piety gain by using up all of a level's walls on boons, they aren't really in any danger if they do. Additionally, while most Binlor devotees tend to convert out to more attractive late-game deities before their piety gain is superseded by wall loss, Binlor's Paladins instead rely on the very useful late-game stoneskin (65% phys res. and Might for 12 piety) and rocketing magic resistance. Binlor paladins can use Imawal to build a wall without punishment, thus using spare piety at level end to provide extra walls for knockback, piety generation or boon fuel.

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Jehora Jeheyu is a strong monotheistic deity, but JJ Paladins lose all benefit from Holy Work. Jehora never actually deducts piety, and Holy Work does not protect you from his random fits of "boredom", so all you receive is the boon cost discount.

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The Pactmaker still functions for the Paladin, and this is the only case where the Paladin can benefit from multiple deities in the same dungeon run, but he receives no discount on the cost of Pacts. Paladins can often push pact use a little more confidently than other classes, since they're unconcerned about punishment.

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While the most obvious locker item for a Paladin is the Dragon Shield, since it boosts his resistances substantially and compliments the resistance building several deities offer him, specific god strategies reward a variety of preps. Binlor Paladins can get a lot of use out of the Rock Heart (to effectively convert piety to health and mana), Dracul Paladins out of the Vampiric Blade and GG Paladins out of the Fire Heart. EM Paladins can get some mileage out of the Platemail combined with Vine Form. If focussing on HALPMEH, the paladin benefits enormously from the {{i|Soul Orb}} to grant immunity to mana burn. Non-human paladins will generally prefer the attack booster preparation to increase their attack damage. Paladins tend to favour more balanced builds than other melee characters, juggling resistances, mana, health and damage bonuses as well as piety gain and boon use.

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Revision as of 14:29, 9 February 2013

This page is about the Full/Beta Version of the game, if you are looking for the Alpha/Free Version, see Alpha:Paladin

Paladin

Tier 3 Class

Class traits

HOLY HANDS

Starts the dungeon session with the HALPMEH glyph

HOLY WORK

Cannot switch religions, god boons cost 20% less and gods will not punish for piety dropping to 0

Class Features

HOLY WORK: Cannot switch religions, god boons cost 20% less and gods will not punish for piety dropping to 0

HOLY SHIELD: Physical resistance starts at +25%

Strategy

Holy Work is the Paladin's defining double-edged class feature, which balances the inability to convert against lower piety costs and an immunity to punishment. Being unable to convert forces the Paladin to use deities monotheistically, which means that deities which normally rely on conversion need to be used differently. However, the Paladin's immunity to punishment compensates for this in two ways, firstly, you don't get punished for angering gods at 0 piety, which means that a Paladin does not need to worry about getting locked out of piety gain (especially relevant with Binlor and Earthmother) and can take actions most classes would need indulgences for (so, using Cydstepp with Tikki Tooki, or healing potions with Dracul or GG), secondly, any piety lost when a Paladin is at 0 piety effectively isn't lost, which can radically increase your overall piety gain with some gods. Lastly, the lower piety cost of boons allows you to get more stat-boosting boons or to get major boons faster, as well as to store up more one-off boons for use against bosses. While the Paladin's other traits primarily encourage his use as a melee fighter, Holy Work makes him more or less as versatile as your proficiency with the gods and understanding of piety gain and loss will allow.

Holy Hands both starts the Paladin with Halpmeh and lets him restore 1 extra HP/level with it. This complements his physical resistance and encourages regen fighting, as he gets more usefulness (against non-magical monsters) from each HP restored by it than a character without resistances would. It also lets the Paladin effectively regen-fight against Snakes and other poisonous monsters without needing to level up to clear poison afterwards, as well as letting him return to full health without using as much black space as most classes would. Holy Shield gives the Paladin 25% physical resistance, which makes the Paladin generally favour physical attackers (for instance, snakes or medusas) over magical ones (such as warlocks or wraiths), and also encourages the Paladin to be careful about racking up an unclearable number of layers of Curse.

The Glowing Guardian is one of the strongest deity choices for a Paladin for a plethora of reasons. Mana potion or item conversion can fuel early-game absolutions, a GG Paladin does not need to worry about his crippling punishment and can use health and mana potions after consuming all his piety (the combination of Protection, Halpmeh and Health Potions can give), Halpmeh allows you to deliberately poison yourself for extra piety gain and an early enlightenment can really add to the Paladin's strength. Cleansing is superb for physically-driven Paladins. On the minus side, most of the GG's pet peeves aside from potion use are hard to use while building up piety, so a poisoning, lifestealing or Bloodtopowaing GG Paladin is more novel than practical.

The Dracul Paladin has similar advantages, in that he can combine Blood Swells, Bloodpools and even Lifesteal with healing potions. The Dracul Paladin has a harder early game, since his piety gain is scarcer and taking Sanguine hits his HP, but his late game is comparably strong, with his +15/15 resistances complimenting the Paladin's natural phys res., the use of over-heal to circumvent lower max health, and the ton of extra health offered by sanguine and repeated bloodswells. Taking out undead (especially in the late game) in rounds after using up your piety is very helpful for avoiding piety loss. Bringing in a Vampiric Blade can help with Dracul's low early piety gain.

Tikki Tooki also offers very useful boons throughout the game and the Paladin benefits substantially from not having to risk his often unmanageable punishments through carelessness. The main issue with TT and particularly a prepped TT is that an incautious Paladin can haemorrhage piety in the mid-game, which will hurt their net piety gain, especially if the Paladin wants to leverage their physical resistances or save up for fairly high-cost second ranks of boons.

Taurog Paladins are unable to convert out, which makes Taurog's function as a piety farm irrelevant if not paired with the Pactmaker, but compensate for this with a very strong early game on account of how quickly the -20% piety cost lets them rack up Taurog's gear, and the fact that with good timing they can combine spellcasting with high-damage attacks in the early game. The +15/15% resistances from Taurog compliment the Paladin's own, and that of any gear he may find or prep, and the +20% damage bonus from Taurog's boons is very useful for a melee class without any built-in damage bonus. Taurog Paladins are not punished for converting Taurog's gear. While this should be avoided until you've definitely used every death protection you can, in an absolutely desperate case it can push you over a conversion threshold, which might clinch a very close game. The Paladin can get more death protections than any other Taurog user for a massive end game spike.

Mystera is one of the most disappointing choices for a Paladin, since she offers no obvious synergy with his class features, and her piety gain is generous enough that he'll rarely get to or need to leverage Holy Work.

The Earthmother is probably the trickiest deity for a Paladin to use, since while his reduced piety cost interacts well with Vine Form and Clearance, and she offers a lot of extra XP over the game, plant generation can create serious mobility problems, especially when Earthmother is prepped. An Earthmother Paladin will tend to have to do a piety-then-plant clearout before level-up. As with Binlor and Taurog, other classes tend to favour using EM as part of a conversion strategy, unlike Binlor and Taurog, her synergies with the paladin are fairly limited.

Binlor Paladins tend to work in more or less the opposite manner to most Binlor devotees, focussing on clearing out their piety reserves before a level-up to avoid the -10 piety hit. A well-managed Binlor Paladin will thus have 80-90 more piety to spare over a game than other Binlor users. The Binlor Paladin can compliment their physical resists with magic resists and Endiswal use, as well as getting good functionality out of the very powerful Stone Form and Stone Fist boons. Furthermore, while Binlor Paladin's don't really want to be locked out of piety gain by using up all of a level's walls on boons, they aren't really in any danger if they do. Additionally, while most Binlor devotees tend to convert out to more attractive late-game deities before their piety gain is superseded by wall loss, Binlor's Paladins instead rely on the very useful late-game stoneskin (65% phys res. and Might for 12 piety) and rocketing magic resistance. Binlor paladins can use Imawal to build a wall without punishment, thus using spare piety at level end to provide extra walls for knockback, piety generation or boon fuel.

Jehora Jeheyu is a strong monotheistic deity, but JJ Paladins lose all benefit from Holy Work. Jehora never actually deducts piety, and Holy Work does not protect you from his random fits of "boredom", so all you receive is the boon cost discount.

The Pactmaker still functions for the Paladin, and this is the only case where the Paladin can benefit from multiple deities in the same dungeon run, but he receives no discount on the cost of Pacts. Paladins can often push pact use a little more confidently than other classes, since they're unconcerned about punishment.

While the most obvious locker item for a Paladin is the Dragon Shield, since it boosts his resistances substantially and compliments the resistance building several deities offer him, specific god strategies reward a variety of preps. Binlor Paladins can get a lot of use out of the Rock Heart (to effectively convert piety to health and mana), Dracul Paladins out of the Vampiric Blade and GG Paladins out of the Fire Heart. EM Paladins can get some mileage out of the Platemail combined with Vine Form. If focussing on HALPMEH, the paladin benefits enormously from the Soul Orb to grant immunity to mana burn. Non-human paladins will generally prefer the attack booster preparation to increase their attack damage. Paladins tend to favour more balanced builds than other melee characters, juggling resistances, mana, health and damage bonuses as well as piety gain and boon use.